


home of the strange

by ell (amywaited)



Series: home of the strange [1]
Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: But Mostly Comfort, Chronology, Comfort, Cute, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Insecure Carlos, Love, M/M, eldritch horror!Cecil, inhuman!cecil, insecure Cecil, listen im making this up as i go, magic!cecil, supportive boyfriends, weird night vale is weird, weird night vale things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:00:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23601208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amywaited/pseuds/ell
Summary: So loving Cecil means this: inexorable love, endless adoration. It means waking up in a bed full of crumbs because Cecil gets hungry at three am and his favourite snack is those disgusting Marmite rice cakes. It means always having someone to hold his hand. It means passing love notes before they each go into work, and it means Cecil will read his aloud on the radio. It means comfort, happiness, and support. It means he’s never alone. And eventually, he learns that Cecil fills all of his empty puzzle pieces, and he’s never been happier.
Relationships: Cecil Palmer/Carlos
Series: home of the strange [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1719577
Comments: 21
Kudos: 147





	home of the strange

**Author's Note:**

> title is from [home of the strange](https://open.spotify.com/track/5StPH4TQc6UYYgfu10yMiR?si=XDtI2XpqSYiXke1ogeAl5A) by young the giant.
> 
> forewarning: literally making everything up as i go along but its night vale, so please just accept it. lol. enjoy!!!

When Carlos first arrives in Night Vale, he’s not quite sure what he is and isn’t allowed to do. Because there’s obviously rules about it (like the hooded figures, and the dog park, and the forest), but it’s not written down anywhere. Everyone just seems to  _ know.  _

Everyone, that is, except for Carlos.

He’s got a laboratory, and a small studio apartment, with a kitchenette that is, thankfully, free of mold and singing dung beetles (which he had been warned about on his first visit to Rico’s). He has enough money to get by, enough time to listen to the pterodactyl harmonies on the radio and get five (probably) hours of sleep a night. 

And he knows he’s allowed to take samples and run tests. He’s allowed to listen to the radio broadcasts every evening, and drive around town in the mornings if his car feels up to it. He’s allowed to have pizza for breakfast and also for dinner (but never for lunch). 

Mostly, he’s just afraid of committing a social faux pas, because punishments in Night Vale seem to range from ‘eating a stalk of raw broccoli’ to ‘medieval torture methods’ and everything in between, so it’s probably a good thing that Cecil decided to take him under his wing (figuratively, and, well. Literally, too. Carlos supposes he’d better start getting used to that sort of thing). 

  


╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


The first thing he learns is the thing about pens. Which is surprising, and weird, but relatively tame, actually, for Night Vale. 

Cecil is inspecting his lab after his broadcast on the radio (which Carlos had dutifully listened to). He’d asked to see where Carlos worked, and Carlos had had a remarkably hard time saying no to him. He’s still not sure if it’s the whole ‘Voice of Night Vale’ stuff, or if he’s just embarrassingly easy for Cecil. 

“Carlos, what’s this?” Cecil asks, after he’d thoroughly rifled through everything on Carlos’s desk, and waved hello to the trees outside the window. 

“What’s what?”

“This,” Cecil says. He points to something on a workbench. “Is it… is it a pen?”

Carlos nods, peering at the open notebook and black biro, obviously tossed aside in a hurry. “Yeah. Why?”

Cecil makes some sort of screeching noise. It’s remarkably reminiscent of bird song, if bird song had been run through a synthesiser and set to an EDM track. “You have to get rid of it!”

“What?” Carlos frowns. He picks up the pen and examines it. “Why? There’s nothing wrong with it.”

Cecil tugs his shirt sleeve over his fingertips and snatches the pen off of him. He drops it on the floor and hisses several words in a language that sounds like nothing Carlos has ever heard before. The pen promptly bursts into green flames, spitting sparks and smelling oddly of burning toast. 

The fire dies down after burning violently for several minutes. The pen is nothing but a pile of dust on the floor, which Cecil hurriedly blows away. 

“What was that for?” Carlos asks. He feels a little bit shell shocked, though he supposes that’s a normal reaction to seeing someone perform honest-to-God witchcraft on an innocent biro in front of him. 

Cecil gives him a look that says something like ‘You’re so stupid but I love you anyway’. “Didn’t anyone tell you? Standard writing utensils are outlawed, silly. I don’t know how you managed to keep this one for so long.”

The best explanation Carlos can come up with is ‘Night Vale’. 

“Well, what do I use instead, then?”

Cecil shrugs. “I’ve no idea. I heard that some people have been funneling their blood into a quill and using that. It really brings a whole new meaning to ‘signed in blood’, doesn’t it?”

“I can’t just set up an IV every time I need to take notes, though,” Carlos says. “I’d need so much blood.”

“I can get some blood for you, if you’d like.”

“What?! No!”

“Otherwise, you’re welcome to bring it up with the City Council,” Cecil continues. “They might make an exception for you, since you’re technically an outsider.”

Carlos grimaces. He’s only ever seen the City Council from a distance, and has yet to find a reason to observe them from any closer. “Really?”

Cecil just smiles. “You’ll just have to try. They wouldn’t kill you, though, so you’d really have nothing to worry about.”

For some reason, being killed is actually the least of Carlos’s worries. That night, he dreams of Iron Maidens and Racks and wonders, not for the first time, if he’s made a mistake in coming to Night Vale. 

  


╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


So he stops using pens. He let Cecil gather every single writing utensil he has left and they burnt them together. It was vaguely romantic, and Cecil had regaled his radio listeners with a greatly embellished tale about it the next day. Cecil had even had to frantically pat down Carlos’s chest after the flames spit quite ferociously and his shirt caught alight. Carlos had spent the next week thinking about it (and trying to Google how to remove burn stains).

Incidentally, Google doesn’t quite work  _ right  _ in Night Vale. Which is, in hindsight, only to be expected. Carlos feels like kicking himself for not realising it earlier, but after struggling through using Chrome for three weeks, things are getting on his nerves. 

So he calls Cecil. Which is fast becoming his go to response to doing anything. 

“Cecil, the internet isn’t working.”

“Pardon me, dear Carlos?”

“The internet isn’t working,” Carlos repeats. He ignores the butterflies and flowers that sprout in his stomach at the pet name. “I don’t know how to fix it.”

“I hope you don’t mind this being a segment on the radio,” Cecil says, absently, like he’s focused on the inner workings of a refrigerator and the complexities of space and time at the same time. “Well, what browser are you using?”

“Chrome,” Carlos says. “Isn’t that standard these days? I mean, I tried Firefox for a few days, and Bing, but they were even worse.”

“Oh, Carlos,” Cecil says. He sounds like he’s smiling. “Listeners, how adorable is he?”

“Cecil.”

“Right, of course. Did no one tell you that Night Vale prefers the electrical current produced by Internet Explorer?”

“How can a city prefer one internet browser over another?” Carlos asks. He’s never heard of that ever happening before - but then again, he’d never heard of a lot of things before coming to Night Vale. 

Cecil hums. “Why don’t you test it and find out? You know what your science does to me.”

It’s probably not something that the citizens of Night Vale need to know. But it’s far from the worst thing Cecil’s ever said on air. Particularly about their relationship (which is still in its early stages, and Carlos isn’t quite sure where they stand yet). Carlos is well acquainted with the bashful little bubble of embarrassment that rises whenever Cecil reports on things like that. 

“Yes,” Carlos says. “Yeah. Okay. Thanks, Cecil.”

“Oh, of course! I’m always happy to help you,” Cecil replies. “I’ll see you later?”

“Yeah,” Carlos says. “Yeah. Bye.”

He hangs up. And then, reluctantly, opens an Internet Explorer tab on his computer. Which, to his instinctual disgust, works quicker than any browser he has ever used, anywhere. 

  


╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


Cecil is flopping on Carlos’s work bench. Carlos is trying really very hard not to be distracted by it, but Cecil is wearing a purple crop top that looks like he cut it himself (given that the hem is wonky), and a pair of lemon yellow cargo pants, a pair of glow-in-the-dark suspenders, and swimming goggles stuck on the top of his head. 

He’s doodling on a notepad with a paintbrush. Carlos isn’t sure where he found paint from, since he didn’t seem to have it when he arrived and Carlos certainly doesn’t keep it in his lab. But he’s rather enjoying being able to look at Cecil being still, and quiet, and just existing right now. He’s almost tempted to put down his work, and reach over to curl a hand in Cecil’s hair and trace over the tattoos winding across his body. 

But then the slab of concrete on his desk squeaks, and Carlos remembers why he’s here on a Sunday evening. He takes a few more photos of the slab, and makes a couple more notes, and then he picks up a hammer. 

“CARLOS! NO!”

Carlos looks up. Cecil has dropped his notebook, and his paintbrush is dripping paint all over the floor. He looks desperately concerned, and he’s even pulled off the swimming goggles. 

“What?”

“You can’t use hammers,” Cecil says, getting up and slowly removing the hammer from Carlos’s grip. “Unless you have a hammer license. Do you have a hammer license?”

“Well, no,” Carlos says because he doesn’t. And he’s never lived in a place where you need a license to start smashing concrete to bits. 

Cecil gives another one of his looks. It always amazes Carlos how truly expressive Cecil can be, with his face, and his hands, and his voice, and his tattoos. This look says ‘you’re so cute, but what am I going to do with you? You’re going to get yourself arrested one of these days, oh! I just want to wrap you up in cotton wool and keep you safe forever.’

It makes Carlos feel all fluffy inside. 

“Well, then,” Cecil says. “You’ll have to apply for one. Luckily, I happen to have a license, so I can perform all the hammering you may require whilst you wait for the application to be accepted. So what do you need me to hammer?”

“Just, um, just the concrete,” Carlos says. Cecil smiles at him, and pulls his goggles over his eyes. “Just be careful. There’s something inside.”

Something about watching Cecil, in his purple crop top and his silvery hair all messy from the goggles, standing there with a hammer, swinging it at a slab, is stupidly hot. Carlos has to restrain himself from jumping Cecil right there and then, since it would be a pretty bad idea to get in the way of a hammer, and a severe breach of whatever lab safety Night Vale has decided it would like to practice today. 

After, once the slab has disintegrated into a cloud of grey dust and coated every surface in the vicinity (Carlos and Cecil included), and the gemstone inside has been revealed, Cecil gives him a rather enthusiastic kiss. The dust is awful, and it gets in Carlos’s mouth, and the gemstone emanates an ominous turquoise-y glow, but everything else is just perfect. 

  


╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


Carlos’s hammer license gets delivered, Cecil gets a pair of lime crocs with all the little decorations (and Carlos considers cursing them to eternal damnation), they move in together and Carlos thought he had Night Vale figured out. 

Turns out, he doesn’t. Which should not be as surprising as he finds it. 

He gets home after the longest day he thinks he’s ever had (both in Night Vale, and outside of Night Vale. Which is saying something). A run in with a painfully egotistical intern, a tense phone call with his boss, and another with his mother, and then an Incident with fireflies. 

“What in the name of the Gods happened to you?” Cecil asks, as soon as the door shuts. He sounds vaguely impressed. 

“Fireflies,” Carlos bites out. 

“The glowing ones or the expl-“

“The exploding ones,” he nearly growls. He’s never going near a firefly again, normal or not. “Turns out, these ones were radio-activated, and when Intern Christine began her experiment on magnetic radiation, it triggered them to explode. With goop.”

“Oh, Carlos,” Cecil says. “Here. Why don’t you go to take a shower? I’ll handle dinner tonight.”

Carlos deliberates. Last time Cecil cooked, they ended up calling the secret police and the fire department, and ended up in an outside newspaper as a speculated UFO landing. 

“I’ve been practicing,” Cecil insists. “I even did a blood ritual, darling, everything will be fine.” He steps forward to press a kiss to Carlos’s lips, ignoring all of the luminescent firefly slime and the fact that it saturates his own shirt. 

“If you’re sure…”

“I’m sure,” Cecil says. “I promise. Take a shower. And don’t forget to say hello to the dung beetles!”

Carlos grimaces. “I thought we got rid of those.”

Cecil shrugs, pushing him off in direction of the bathroom. “We tried to. Short of burning the apartment down and sacrificing ourselves to the Gods, I don’t see what we can do now.”

Carlos pushes the bathroom door open and sighs. The dung beetles on the windowsill wave at him, and he waves back out of politeness. “We could call a pest exterminator,” he calls out to Cecil.

Cecil gasps. “Don’t say that in front of them! You’ll hurt their feelings!”

He bites his tongue, hard, and steps into the shower, hoping it’ll wash away everything about the day. 

  


* * *

  


Dinner turns out to be surprisingly edible. Cecil looks incredibly proud of himself, and they only have to throw away one of the pans. 

“Thanks, Cecil,” Carlos says. There’s still firefly gloop in his hair, and in the low level light, it seems to glow in the same way Cecil’s tattoos do. “You really are getting better.”

Cecil blushes. “Well, thank you, dear Carlos. It was probably the ritual I did, but I appreciate it.”

“Hey, you deserve some of that credit,” Carlos tells him. He starts to stack their bowls up, carrying them over to the sink. “After all, the ritual wouldn’t have worked that much if you didn’t have any skill at all.”

Cecil drapes himself all over Carlos’s back. “You are  _ so  _ smart, Carlos. I’m sorry you had a bad day today.”

Carlos turns, so Cecil has him bracketed against the kitchen counter and he can kiss him. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Then I’m apologising on behalf of the universe,” Cecil says. He rests their foreheads together, and Carlos can feel the fluttering of the eyelashes on his third eye. “It treated you poorly today.”

Carlos giggles. “Thank you, then. On behalf of the universe.”

“Now,” Cecil says. His fingers run up Carlos’s arm, and his tattoos squirm. “We ought to go to bed. It’s getting late, isn’t it?”

“It’s barely eight-“

Cecil gives him a look that says ‘are you sure it’s barely eight? You know how time works here. But also, just come with me and you won’t regret it. Please?’

So Carlos goes. Because how could he ever say no to his Cecil. 

  


╔═══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


“Cecil?”

Cecil pokes his head around the door. He’s holding a tea towel that looks like it’s been thoroughly soaked in green… sludge. “Yes, sweetie?”

“You know when we found all of my pens?” Carlos says. He taps his duck feather-cocktail stick non standard writing utensil against his notepad. 

“What about it?”

“And you set them all on fire?”

Cecil nods, slowly. He disappears for a second and is back before Carlos even blinks, having put the tea towel back in the kitchen and is now curling up under Carlos’s arm (which should be impossible, according to physics, since Cecil is taller and lankier than humanly possible. And Carlos is not.)

“I did,” Cecil says. “It was to protect you, you do know that, right?”

“Of course I know that,” Carlos says. Cecil snuggles closer to him. “I was just wondering, um. How. You set them on fire?”

“Ah,” Cecil says. He stops snuggling. 

“Ah?”

“I was wondering when that would come up,” he says. He sounds embarrassed and shy, neither of which appear on Cecil very often. “I don’t want you to be angry that I kept it from you, or upset about it, or afraid…”

“Why would I be afraid? I don’t think anything could phase me now,” Carlos says. “Why? What is it?”

Cecil makes a face. The only difference is that Carlos can’t read this one. “I suppose you would call it… magic? Wizardry. Spells.”

“You can do magic,” Carlos says. “Like, non-ritualistic magic?”

“I don’t specifically need to perform a ritual to perform magic, yes,” Cecil says. “However, they would strengthen it.”

“So the pens…”

“Was simple,” Cecil bites his lip. “It was easy magic, and not very powerful.”

Carlos hums. His fingers itch for the notebook again but Cecil is more important. “Right. So an example of a powerful spell would be…?”

“I suppose if you filled our entire apartment with pens, and I set those all alight,” Cecil says, consideringly. “That would be a powerful spell.”

“Right,” Carlos says, even though he’s kind of lost. “Okay. Cool."

Cecil sits back slightly to look Carlos in the eye. Even his third one opens, so Carlos decides that whatever happens next will be important. He says, “so you’re really not angry?”

Carlos pulls him into a hug. Cecil’s nose squashes into his chest and its kind of uncomfortable, but the noise of contentment that Cecil makes is so worth it. “Of course I’m not angry. If you’d kept it from me forever, then yeah, maybe I’d be a little upset. But this is new, right?”

“Right,” Cecil says. It’s muffled, said through a mouthful of Carlos’s shirt. 

“I don’t expect you to tell me everything immediately. Just like you shouldn’t expect me to  _ believe _ everything immediately. I’m a sci-“

“A scientist,” Cecil interrupts. “I know. You need evidence before you accept a theory.”

“Exactly. And I had evidence, since I saw it. And I doubt you’d lie to me at this point. Really, I’d already sort of guessed. I know you’re not quite a standard human being.”

Cecil makes an affronted sound. Carlos strokes a hand through his hair. 

“I think you’re the best thing in the entire world, Cece. I don’t care if you’re not fully human, magic, supernatural, paranormal, or whatever else you could be. I just care that I love you,” Carlos says. “Is that okay?”

Cecil sniffs. He makes a noise that could be a sob and could also be a woman in labour. “Oh, Carlos. Beautiful, perfect Carlos. Everyone is going to love this on the broadcast tomorrow. You’re so cute.” He giggles and lifts his head up from Carlos’s chest, knocking forehead against chin in an attempt to kiss him. “I love you so much.”

“Can I ask you about it?” Carlos asks, pressing a kiss into Cecil’s hair. He feels him nod beneath his hands. 

“What would you like to know?”

“How did you… become magic?”

Cecil shuffles about a bit, realigning himself so he can sit with his head in Carlos’s lap. Carlos immediately puts his hands in his hair, twirling the curls around his fingers. “It began when I was probably about eleven. I think that’s when the third eye first appeared, too.”

“So it’s a Voice thing?”

Cecil shrugs. “I’m not sure. It might be. I never had a chance to really look into it, and there weren’t many reports on it anyway. I could always control it, and it didn’t seem malicious, so we didn’t pay it much mind.”

“But how did you learn all the spells?”

“I don’t remember,” Cecil says. “I don’t remember learning them. I just sort of… knew them. The same way everyone just knows how to do a bloodstone ritual, even though we never get taught.”

Carlos decides not to mention that he doesn’t know how to do a bloodstone ritual, because he probably doesn’t count, being from the outside. “Did it get stronger as you got older?”

“Well, I suppose so,” Cecil says. “It must be like a muscle, getting stronger whenever you use it.”

“That makes sense,” Carlos says. It does for Night Vale, anyway. “Thank you.”

“What for?” Cecil asks. He puts his hands atop Carlos’s, squeezing their fingers together. 

Carlos smiles. “I don’t know. For being.”

“Oh, stop it,” Cecil says. “You’re so sweet. Say it again.”

“Thank you for existing, Cecil.”

The happy little giggle Cecil lets out is objectively the most adorable thing Carlos has ever heard. He decides he’s never going to let Cecil go. 

  


╔═ ══*.·:·.☽✧ ✦ ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

  


He discovers what loving Cecil means on a Thursday. At least, it’s probably Thursday. The days pass differently in Night Vale, and every clock in the town had frozen on a different time a week ago, and had yet to fix themselves (or, return to as close to fixed as Night Vale would allow). Anyone who had attempted to fix them manually had met with their unfortunate demise, so everyone is staying as far away as possible. 

So it’s probably a Thursday. The weather is a bit screech-y, with lots of guitar riffs, and the traffic could be worse. The Glow Cloud (all hail) hasn’t had any hiccups recently, and the dog park is still as unthinkable as usual.

All in all, it’s a normal day. Normal for Night Vale, anyway. 

Which is how Carlos knows something is wrong. 

It fills him with a strange emotion to know that he’s now so in tune with the city that he can tell when something is off. He remembers the early days, where not a day had passed where his flight, fight, or freeze instinct hadn’t gone off. 

Cecil had befriended him, then boyfriend-ed him, and then asked him to move in and guided him through Night Vale like teaching a toddler. Maybe some of Cecil had rubbed off on him, Carlos thinks. Cecil and his omniscience and the rest. Cecil and his sixth sense for danger. Cecil and his seventh sense for Carlos. 

He calls Cecil, wondering if he’s being clingy and stupid, and then he considers hanging up. Which would probably just make Cecil even more worried, so he doesn’t. But then he pulls the phone away from his ear to press the end call button when Cecil picks up. 

“Sweet Carlos, I didn’t expect to hear from you until this afternoon!” Cecil says. He’s using his radio voice. It fills Carlos with an even stranger emotion to know that he can now tell the difference between Cecil’s at home voice and his radio voice. 

Carlos clutches the phone like a lifeline. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Cecil asks. He says to the listeners, “Oh, listeners, isn’t he so sweet? What did I ever do to deserve him?”

“Something just feels wrong,” Carlos says. “I was just checking in, but it doesn’t matter. I’ll see you tonight?”

“I wouldn’t ignore your feelings, darling,” Cecil says wisely. “Night Vale is quite intelligent when it comes to those. If you think something is wrong, then something is probably wrong.”

Great. 

“I trust you’ll find out what it is soon,” Cecil continues. “Stay safe, my dove. I love you.”

“Love you too,” Carlos says. Cecil hangs up, which makes sense. He shouldn’t have called while Cecil was on air. And he’s right; Carlos can figure out what's going on. 

If Night Vale is as empathetic and influential as everyone says, then surely it shouldn’t be too hard to find out. 

He decides to take Cecil’s advice and does as many tests as he can stand, sampling the air and the water, and the ground, and the leaves from as many plants as he can find. He samples the chemical structure of the grass and the biological makeup of the tree bark too, just to see. He also considers going back to the apartment so he can take some of Cecil’s hair, or something, and test that too, before coming to the conclusion that that is edging on way too stalker-ish for him.

So then he compares the results with the results that he’d gotten when he first tested everything, when he first got to Night Vale. And everything is… 

The exact same. 

It‘s anticlimactic, to say the least. And incredibly worrying. Maybe Carlos has gone insane. Maybe he’s gone insane with how much he loves Cecil, maybe Night Vale is messing with his mind and he has to get out, get out, get  _ out.  _

Oh, Jesus. Carlos’s heart stiffens up and the windows begin to rattle in their panes. He drops his petri dishes on a desk, not caring if bacteria spreads through his whole lab, and then he curls into a ball under the table. A book falls off of the surface, one of the ones Carlos brought from outside. It remains unaffected by Night Vale, thankfully, and as such, he hasn’t had it forcibly removed from his dwellings yet. 

There he waits, for the sun to go down and the roof to stop shuddering, and he fills his brain with the mindless monotony of reciting every number of pi. 

  


* * *

  


Cecil lets himself in. Which is good. Carlos doesn’t think he could stand. 

“Carlos?”

The door jerks against the jamb. 

“Carlos? Darling Carlos, where are you?” Cecil calls. Carlos watches his feet move further into the lab, adorned with his god awful crocs. “Did you figure out what was wrong?”

Carlos feels like he can’t breathe. 

Cecil kneels down and peers directly under the table. Carlos tracks him, almost warily. “Oh, Carlos.”

Cecil crawls under the table with him, which seems to be quite the feat. He manages to bend his knees up and slouch enough to avoid smacking his head on the underside of it, and so he can rest it on Carlos’s shoulder. Carlos finds himself leaning further into Cecil’s body than he expected. 

The most confusing thing about Cecil, Carlos thinks, is that he looks like he should be cold. His long, skinny limbs, his so-pale-it's-almost-translucent skin, the way he always looks gaunt, like he’s skipped way too many meals. It translates to Carlos’s science-addled mind that he should be cold. But he isn’t, he’s remarkably warm. 

Cecil moves one of his hands round to start stroking through Carlos’s hair. “Whatever happened to make you so upset, my dear?”

Carlos sighs. “Nothing. I don’t know. I couldn’t tell what was wrong. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m what's wrong.”

“Don’t say that!” Cecil gasps. His hand stops in Carlos’s hair and moves to cup his chin. “There isn’t anything wrong with you at all.”

“Then what could be so abnormal today?” Carlos says. “Everything is the same. You haven’t said anything, so I’m probably the only one feeling it. Ergo, there’s something wrong with me.”

“In Night Vale, we discourage the ignorance of hunches,” Cecil says. “And you, Carlos, are one of the smartest, cleverest, most inquisitive, intuitive, and observational people I have ever met. If you think something is wrong, then I believe something is wrong. And I will do anything to help you find out what.”

Carlos bites back a sob. “I can’t be that smart if I can’t figure out this one stupid little thing. I’m not clever. I’m stupid, and I should never have left home. I should never have even gone to college. My degree is a waste of time.”

“Oh, Carlos, no!” Cecil sounds heartbroken. “Carlos, sweetheart, beautiful, perfect Carlos. You’re so miraculously wonderful, and clever. Perhaps there are some things that we are destined to never know,” he says, stroking his index finger down Carlos’s cheek. “And if this is one of those, then so be it. And I, for one, am glad you came to Night Vale. I never would have met you if you hadn’t, and then we wouldn’t be sitting here. Together.”

“Cecil…”

“There’s nowhere else I’d rather be,” Cecil tells him, so desperately seriously. “Carlos, I promise you. I love you. Night Vale loves you. If you weren’t meant to be here, you wouldn’t be here. I love you.”

He takes in a shaky breath. A tear falls down his cheek, sliding into Cecil’s knuckles. It forms a purple ripple across his skin, like his tattoos are catching it and holding him tight. 

“It’s just…”

“Just what?”

“Night Vale is so  _ much  _ sometimes,” Carlos says, after a minute of deliberating. He doesn’t want this to hurt Cecil, or the city as a whole. “It’s so different to Colorado. And I love it here, I do. With you, with this work, and how batshit fucking crazy it is sometimes. I love it.”

Cecil just looks at him. “But…?”

“But it’s hard to get used to it,” Carlos says. “It’s so completely opposite to what I used to know. And yet I feel like I’ve spent my whole life just waiting to come here. Like this was where I was supposed to end up.”

“Destiny,” Cecil says wisely. “She is a cruel mistress. And one we shall never figure out. I’m glad you’re here, my sweet. And, if it might make you happier, or more comfortable, I would be happy to accompany you back to your previous home, should you wish to go.”

That sets Carlos off properly, pulling sob after sob from his throat. Cecil pulls him into his chest, tucking Carlos’s head under his chin. Carlos thinks he hears something that could be Cecil’s skull bumping the underside of the table, but he makes no move to complain, so instead he sinks into Cecil’s hold. 

His body heat is warm and comfortable, and for as bony as he looks, Cecil is actually remarkably soft. It certainly helps to slow Carlos’s racing heart. 

“Would you really go back to Colorado with me?” Carlos asks, after several minutes of choked hiccups. “Just for a visit. I wouldn’t want to take you away from Night Vale forever.”

“A wise choice,” Cecil says cryptically. “And of course. I would follow you anywhere. Besides, I would love to see where you grew up. I hope your parents have many photos of you as a child. I can’t wait to see them.”

It makes him laugh, which is probably Cecil’s intention, even if the laugh is really snotty and sticky and gross. “Thank you. And I love you too.”

Cecil smiles too. “The end of the world couldn’t take me away from you, sweet Carlos. A little unexplainable mystery has no chance.”

So loving Cecil means this: inexorable love, endless adoration. It means waking up in a bed full of crumbs because Cecil gets hungry at three am and his favourite snack is those disgusting Marmite rice cakes. It means always having someone to hold his hand. It means passing love notes before they each go into work, and it means Cecil will read his aloud on the radio. It means comfort, happiness, and support. It means he’s never alone. And eventually, he learns that Cecil fills all of his empty puzzle pieces, and he’s never been happier. 

  


**Author's Note:**

> let me know ur thoughts!!
> 
> might do a follow on where they go to colorado? (i couldnt find any definitive of where carlos lived before nightvale and im not very in touch w/ the fandom yet, so i dont know what the most favoured answer is. so i chose colorado.)
> 
> regardless: i hope this was somewhat enjoyable! thank u for reading!


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